Known techniques to extinguish fires in oil wells where the overall pressure is above atmospheric pressure, have mainly relied on the effect of the blow produced by the burst of the explosive charge. These techniques, being extremely dangerous and slow, cause irreparable damage to the material used to set up the charges in position, which makes it also extremely expensive.
It would seem that the raising of an isolating barrier between a combustible and a fuel together with the cooling of the combustible would seem to be a preferable technique to fight such fires, but up to the present, it has not been possible to create this condition in case of fires in oil wells where the overall pressure is above atmospheric pressure.